


rather be spitting blood (the homecoming remix)

by darlingargents



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Blood and Violence, Canon Compliant, Canon Era, Character Study, Gen, Nightmares, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Remix, Remix Revival 2018, dreams of blood and violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-16
Updated: 2018-09-16
Packaged: 2019-06-25 17:50:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15645858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darlingargents/pseuds/darlingargents
Summary: The Temple feels like it’s full of ghosts.





	rather be spitting blood (the homecoming remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Redrikki](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Redrikki/gifts).
  * Inspired by [No Place Like Home](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14214417) by [Redrikki](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Redrikki/pseuds/Redrikki). 



> Title (the first part, at least) is from The Quiet by Troye Sivan.
> 
> Ahsoka has a nightmare in about the middle of the story in which her friends die violently. The description is short, but somewhat vivid, and may potentially be triggering. I didn't warn for Graphic Depictions of Violence, but if it had been longer I might have, so please keep that in mind if you're sensitive to depictions of violence.

The Temple feels like it’s full of ghosts.

The massive halls normally filled with Jedi are empty and nearly silent. During her walk through the entrance hall, Ahsoka sees fewer than ten Jedi, and the ones who weren’t alone — scurrying quickly between hallways and out of sight, as if they were afraid of the echoing silence — were whispering and walking quickly. Jedi were supposed to be above superstition, and Ahsoka has always considered herself to be — but as she ducks down the hallway that leads to her old dormitory room, she glances back and swears one of the Old Republic Jedi statues is watching her.

She’s bone-weary from the near-constant fighting that has been her life for these past months, but she doesn’t give into the temptation to collapse onto her bed the moment she gets to her room. Instead, she ignores her exhausted and screaming muscles and begins unpacking. Her bag is small, and there isn’t much to take out — a couple changes of clothes and armour, a ration bar that somehow ended up there, various personal sundries. Near the bottom is a small wooden carving of a tooka, given to her by a young child on — where was it?

She picks up the miniature tooka and looks closely at it. She remembers the child giving it to her, a small blue hand placing it in her waiting palm, but nothing else — not the child’s face, or species, or when it was.

It disturbs her, somewhere deep inside, that she’s managed to forget so quickly. One deployment blends into the next, and you don’t remember where you are or why you’re fighting—

She winces and drops the tooka, pressing her hands over her eyes. In the dark, she can hear the distant rattle of blasterfire.

* * *

Ahsoka has two weeks off. Anakin isn’t here, he’s off with Obi-Wan fighting somewhere else, and she’s engaged in her classes. It doesn’t escape her attention how limited the attendance is. She dutifully transcribes the lessons onto her datapad as the lecturer drones on in Basic Politics And Senates And Governments And Whatever 101, and sneaks glances at the other seven padawans in the room. This class is a requirement. There are two hundred seats that are normally full.

Not today. Not anymore. She sits at the back and wonders why her fellow students aren’t currently deployed. A couple are obvious — serious injuries that require excess recovery time — but the rest is a guessing game. No master, or master killed in action? Discovered to be unfit for active duty and assigned to the Temple as a healer or other position? One of the protestors — rare among her peers, but there were a handful who had done so — who refused to fight out of moral principle?

She realizes after staring at her classmates for what only feels like a couple of minutes that the class is over. She’d lost the whole thing. She looks down at her datapad, and drops her stylus. In the corner of the empty page intended for notes, she’d drawn a blaster. She’s halfway through sketching a body in the foreground.

“Padawan Tano?”

She forces her gaze away from the half-finished doodle. “Yes, master?”

“Are you alright?” Ahsoka can’t remember her name. She’s human, with dark skin and long white hair twisted into dozens of braids. She’s been an instructor as long as Ahsoka can remember.

“Fine,” she says, and shoves her datapad in her bag. “Thanks.” She doesn’t look back as she leaves.

* * *

It’s too blasted quiet.

She goes to sleep each night in a room by herself, sound-proofed enough that she can’t hear anyone around her. On the  _ Resolute _ , her room had been so small she could barely turn around unless she was on her bunk, and it was jammed right up against the clone barracks, close enough for her sense their presence in the Force without trying. The metal walls were thin enough that they sometimes seemed like they were barely there at all.

Not here. She finds herself waking up in a panic, jumping out of bed and grabbing a weapon, because this much silence must mean everyone else has been killed—

The fourth time this happens, she doesn’t just go back to sleep. She curls up on her bed, presses her face into her knees, and tries desperately not to cry as images of her friends being murdered flash before her eyes — her nightmare haunting her while awake. Piles and piles of dead clones, mixed in with officers, blood running in rivulets down the floor towards her feet. Rex’s throat slashed, his head barely attached to his body — and Anakin, his torso sliced open, his guts pouring onto the ground.

She doesn’t sleep the rest of that night. She clutches her lightsabers and wills herself to not pick up her commlink and call Anakin. She’s not a youngling. She’s not a  _ baby _ . Her nightmares are hers to bear, and burdening Anakin with them while he’s fighting a war is beyond selfish.

And she thinks that if she tries to speak, she really will cry, and maybe not stop.

* * *

She misses her first two classes the next day, because she only goes back to sleep when it starts getting light outside, and her alarm doesn’t wake her. She’s only just on time to her Strategy class — one of the few that’s still reasonably well-attended.

After, though, it’s like the whole class vanishes into thin air as it disperses. When she goes to lunch, there’s barely anyone in the massive room. She gets her food and sits down to eat. She swears she can hear the echoes of her fork clacking against her plate, it’s so quiet and empty.

A few minutes into that, it’s become unbearable. She pulls out her datapad and goes through her notes for her last few classes, and starts on an assignment. She’ll probably be deployed by the time it’s due, but she might as well start.

It distracts her mind. That’s enough, right now.

* * *

Three days later, she’s recalled back to the front. Anakin meets her on the deck of the  _ Resolute  _ with a few other officers, and it takes all of her effort not to tackle-hug him. She thinks he senses her feelings, because he wraps an arm around her as they walk towards the command centre, and whispers, “All right, Snips?” in her ear when there’s a break in the conversation.

“Fine,” she says, and detangles herself from him. And she’s not really lying — she feels better, being back. She’s itching to  _ do _ something, to prove that she can.

Maybe if she gets back into the action and makes her body busy, it’ll stop her mind from doing… whatever it did, those days back at the Temple.

A few minutes after Ahsoka’s arrival, they enter hyperspace again. In a day and a half, they’ll be at war again. For now, Ahsoka grabs lunch. The clamor of the mess hall is almost comforting. Especially when she thinks back to the empty hall at the Temple.

She sits down with Rex once she gets her food, and gets regaled with tales of the 501st’s adventures since she left. It’s not until nearly the end of the meal that Rex manages to ask how her leave was.

For a brief moment, looking at him, she can see his throat opening and pouring blood. The nightmare has stuck with her. She’s not sure it’ll ever leave.

“Fine,” she says. “A little quiet. It’s good to be back.”

* * *

That night, she falls asleep to the distant thrum of engines and snoring of clones. She doesn’t wake up until morning.


End file.
